The present invention relates to an electric cable connector and, more particularly, to a wire management member for use with an electric cable connector.
Electric cable connectors generally comprise a rectangular, electrically insulative connector housing. The connector housing includes a plurality of terminals. The terminals each have a tail extending out of one end of the connector housing and suspending in the open air for soldering to respective wires of an electric cable. Because the tail of each of the terminals is respectively suspending in the open air, it is difficult to solder the wires of the electric cable to the tail of each of the terminals, and one wire of the electric cable may be soldered to two or more terminals accidentally.
The present invention has been accomplished to provide an electric cable connector, which eliminates the aforesaid problems.
It is an object of the present invention to provide an electric cable connector which has a wire management member to receive and support the tail of each terminal, preventing the tail of each terminal from breaking due to suspension in the open air.
It is another object of the present invention to provide an electric cable connector which has a wire management member to receive and support the wires of the electric cable, keeping the wires of the cable arranged in good order for soldering to the tail of each of the terminals accurately and rapidly.
It is still another object of the present invention to provide an electric cable connector with a wire management member that keeps the wires of the electric cable isolated from one another to achieve better electric properties.
It is still another object of the present invention to provide an electric cable connector with a wire management member having one or more positioning rods extending from a surface of the wire management member to be receiving within a respective cavity with the connector housing, as compared to prior art connectors having a wire management member that engages a recess in an outer wall of the connector housing. Such a configuration is particularly advantageous in very small connectors where it is not practical to have a wire management system engage an outer wall of the connector body. Moreover, the present invention is advantageous over the prior art because the tooling for manufacturing the connector housing and wire management member can be simplified.
To achieve these and other objects of the present invention, an electric cable connector is provided comprised of a connector housing, a cable, and a wire management member. The connector housing includes terminals inserted therein. Each of the terminals has a tail extending out of one end of the connector housing for electrically soldering to respective wires of the cable. The wire management member is joined to the connector housing by positioning rods that are received within housing cavities. The wire management member may include a plurality of terminal grooves adapted to receive the tail of each of the terminals, thereby preventing the tail of each terminal from being suspended in the air, and a plurality of wire grooves adapted to receive the wires of the cable for enabling the wires to be respectively positively soldered to the tail of each of the terminals. Ribs may be located between adjacent terminal grooves to prevent solder intended from one of the terminals to migrate to other of the terminals. The wire management member can be made having multiple platforms disposed at different elevations to receive vertically spaced rows of terminals.